AMBULANCE

In the space of four hours on a sunny Monday afternoon, the eastbound lanes of the QEW in Burlington were closed twice so air ambulances could carry seriously injured parties away from separate collisions.

In the second crash, a female passenger was ejected from a pickup truck when it rolled. She died at the scene. Two others were rushed to hospital.

The eastbound lanes between Appleby Line and Burloak Drive remained closed for several hours after the 4:40 p.m. chain-reaction crash that also involved two cars.

The drivers of the other vehicles were not hurt.

A second female passenger in the pickup was airlifted from the scene, while a male passenger was transported by ground ambulance. An infant in the pickup was also taken to hospital as a precaution, but is OK. The driver, the baby's father, suffered minor injuries.

OPP Sergeant Kerry Schmidt says police believe the deceased woman is the baby's grandmother. He believes some of the victims are from out of the province.

About three and a half hours earlier and several kilometres to the west, the driver of a garbage truck was airlifted from the scene of a rollover as he attempted to negotiate the on-ramp to the highway from Guelph Line.

Schmidt said the male driver — the truck's sole occupant — had been trapped inside and was airlifted to an area hospital in serious condition.

The green garbage truck wound up on its side, partially on the ramp and partially on the outside lane of the highway. All lanes of the highway were shut down to allow an Ornge air ambulance helicopter to land on the highway.

The garbage truck belongs to GFL Environmental, a contractor whose clients include the City of Hamilton, Toronto and Durham Region.

The Toronto Star recently reported that GFL trucks were involved in 274 collisions provincewide between June 2012 and July 2014. It said 65 convictions resulted from those collisions.

The province downgraded the company's safety rating from "satisfactory" to "conditional" in April, the Star reported.